Ward grew-up in the suburbs of New York in CT. His best friend’s Dad was an ad agency exec and they used to critique TV ads at the ripe young age of 10. Ward loved to play baseball and football as a kid, becoming proud of the scabs and dislocated digits. At college graduation, he knew advertising sales was for him and luckily McGraw-Hill had an entry-level job for him in San Francisco. He never went back East and climbed up the magazine publishing world via computer trade magazines, The Wall Street Journal and he Founded Forbes ASAP, a technology spin-off of Forbes magazine.

Curious about technology, he jumped to the Internet joining Netscape and later served as VP Sales for Flycast, one of the early ad networks during Web 1.0. Since then, ran the North American division of a SEM firm and was the first VP Sales at Adify, the ad network platform for Publishers for Web 2.0. At the Rubicon Project, Ward enjoys helping his pals in the publishing community make a few extra bucks with the ad networks.

For fun, Ward loves to hike, cook and chase his three kids around the backyard. He’s been in the Bay Area most of his professional life and gives back by coaching many sales and marketing executives with their careers.

Kids: Christine, Daisy and Bailey

Some favorites:

• Movie: Gladiator, The English Patient
• Food: Pizza and chocolate malts
• Quote: “Be the change you seek in the world”, Gandhi
• Hobbies: skiing, scuba diving, gardening, politics